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Dorothy Inman is a Louisville transplant from St. Louis, MO. She spent 8 years in the corporate world and is now a stay at home mom. She is currently pursuing a career in writing and also co-leads the "Create" Art team at her church. Join her in her musings about writing, art, religion and this thing we call life.

After I watched my friend, Laurel, sprint off to run her first 10K race I was left with a wave of fatigue and relief. I was happy that I had completed the race without dying (always the primary goal in these types of things), but I was also so tired. I felt like at any second my legs would fall out underneath me. Balancing both my bike, helmet and transition bag, I wheeled through the crowd looking for my husband (John Mark), daughter and parents. I was surprised and relieved to run across a friend from church who's dad and brother were competing that day. It was so nice to see a familiar face. She congratulated me on my finish (Later texting me that she was "so, so, so proud of me", which almost made me cry) and told me she would keep a look out for …

If you missed my first installment of The Buckhead Border you can find it here. This is the second of three blogs surrounding the challenge of a lifetime.

THE SWIM

The first wave of swimmers had already started making their way across the murky Ohio river. We watched as they swam through the last two pillars of the Big Four Bridge.

"They are going the wrong way!" Someone yelled. There was confusion among everyone else that was in the stands.

"Uh, don't go that way. You have to go all of the way around the last pillar, then make your way down the shoreline," the official boomed over the megaphone. He proceeded to line the second wave up and then signaled for them to jump in the water.

Splash!

It seemed like only seconds before they called the people with red swim caps to come to the dock. It was all a bit surreal until that happened. The official instructed a volunteer to count out 35 red caps. One, two, three...part of me wished I was in the f…

Tick tock, tick tock. I didn't have a ticking clock, but it
seemed like the minutes, which turned into hours just crawled by as I
tried to get to sleep Saturday night. No doubt it was the nerves that
kept me awake for several hours after my typical "lights out time".
The anticipation of what the next day would bring was a lot to handle,
especially after all of the time I had spent in grueling training for the event. I felt as if my brain was racing down the audobahn at record speeds. There was so much that could go wrong.

The previous day my dad and I went to an informational session about the event.
Some of the communication up to that point had been a little sketchy,
so it didn't surprise me when where I thought the meeting was going to
be was not the correct place. My dad and I made a mad dash to the
actual meeting place and fortunately didn't miss much. One of the
first topics of discussion was the fact that they had tested the
bacteria le…

Nerves. Butterflies. That terrible sick feeling you have when you are pretty sure that everything is going to go wrong. That is what I have been feeling for the past few days in light of my impending triathlon relay. If you recall back when I signed up for the event I was full of hope and felt extremely confident, however now all I feel is tired. Since then I have been biking and swimming (sometimes both on the same day) non stop. A lot of my bike training included pulling my daughter, Alexandria, in a bike trailer (imagine an extra 40-50 lbs) from anywhere between 8 to 14 miles. This is what this stay at home mom had to do to train for an event like this. I have been pretty confident in my swimming capabilities, but because of I have added biking to my daily activities, the laps haven't been as easy as they once were. My body is tired, my brain is tired, everything is just plain tired.

Anyone that knows me knows that I have always been wired to be a more tired person. I…

Inspired by one of my new awesome blogger friends, who does "Thankful Thursdays" and my husband who tells me I am too serious on my blogs, I have decided to start writing "Silly Saturdays". I can tell you that they will most likely be utterly silly and as a result most of you might really roll on the floor laughing (although I highly doubt it because I'm not sure I am really that funny). I cannot however promise that there will not be a serious side or a moral of the story (sorry John Mark, it is in my genes).

So this is how my week started.
I have an extremely spirited daughter. Anyone who knows her is well aware of that fact. She is type A, high energy socialite. A very good friend of my recently called her "The Duchess". And even though she has never met her in person, the title fit. When we named her I didn't want to have a normal, boring name. I wanted something that was filled with greatness and potential. So my husband and I agre…

I took my traditional (three weeks in a row, baby) bike ride down to River Road today. After several long days of rain, today it FINALLY let up. Let me be the first to tell you that I have been really tired as of late. All of the exercising has really let some steam out of my sails. At night I basically fall into bed and become like a zombie while I am catching up on TV shows. So, the rain really aided me in losing my momentum and tempted me to spend one more afternoon on the couch or in bed. However, today I had no excuse.

The ride was a hot one. The past few weeks when I have went on this ride it has been cool, overcast and quite pleasant. Today the sun was out, the sky was blue and the clouds puffy white. Because of the rain I hadn't actually road on my bike since Tuesday. This wasn't great for someone who was going to be in a triathlon relay in less than two weeks. My legs were a little rusty and did I mention it was hot? But I pushed on…

I
met my dear friend, Laura McKenzie just a few months after I gave birth
to my spirited little girl, Alexandria, at the mom's group at my church.
She told me that she too had recently quit her job to spend more time
with her children and that we should get together and have coffee
sometime. By the smile on her face and the natural ease by which she
carried herself, I knew right away that we were going to be instant
friends. Over the past almost two years I have watched and observed her
not only as a parent, but as a Christ follower. The humble, loving
manner by which she carries herself is absolutely inspirational. She
will be the first to admit that she has her bad moments/days, which is
one of the things I love most about her. She never acts like she has
everything together (even though I totally think she does). I always
joke and say that God brought us together for a reason: me being a
former Southern Baptist and she a Catholic,…

There is a letter my third grade teacher, Mrs. Westbrook, gave me on February 16, 1990 that is hanging on my refrigerator. It reads, "I really think you might grow up to be an author. I'm so glad you like to write creative stories! You do a great job!" I leave it there to encourage myself that at one time there was someone out there who saw potential in a 9 year old little girl to be a writer. This life has taken me on some pretty bumpy rides, but if there has been one thing that has been constant, it is my writing. It started with a drawer full of notebooks with unfinished novels in my elementary and teen years. I am hope it ends with a published novel. I started this blog to share my writing with you, but also to share my hopes, dreams, trials and victories.